Mauricio Diaz de Leon is a 5-foot-9 central midfielder from San Diego who is a senior at the University of San Francisco. He is a first team all-conference selection and the Dons’ captain. He’s on pace to graduate a semester early in December with a degree in kinesiology, and his hope is to play soccer professionally somewhere.

“If I get that opportunity, like I did with college, I’m going to take it,” Diaz de Leon says. “I’ve proved that my whole life, when opportunity comes.”

Opportunity. The word flows off his tongue unlike the others, with special care, with a fragility and reverence and grace, precious verbal cargo, pausing ever so slightly afterward, not letting the final syllable collide with the next word.

Opportunity. It can be fleeting for a kid born in Ojocaliente, a small town in Central Mexico. For a kid who moved to the States at age 6 with his family of modest means, with a father working in the construction industry at a time when the construction industry was collapsing. For a kid navigating the pay-to-play world of American youth sports while living with his parents and siblings in a converted garage.

For a kid who didn’t have U.S. citizenship and wanted to go to a four-year private university that estimates the annual cost at $56,624.

“My family always told me good things happen to good people,” says Diaz de Leon, whose Dons play USD on Friday night at 7 at Torero Stadium. “I always grew up that way, thinking that way. Being a good student and being a good soccer player got me this opportunity.

“I mean, it is possible. I made it. I’m here in college without citizenship, basically without anything when we came here. There was an opportunity, and I took it.”

It began 14 years ago, when a soccer club in the upscale suburb of Rancho Bernardo decided to pursue players across the county no matter their heritage or house size. The club’s director, Brian Quinn, is an exponent of the American Dream, growing up Catholic amid the “troubles” of Belfast, Northern Ireland, coming to the States to play pro soccer, gaining citizenship, making 48 appearances for the U.S. national team, having a son attend Dartmouth.

“I remember Danniel Valdez, the coach of our under-9 team, bringing this chubby little Mexican kid who could kick a ball harder than anyone I’ve ever seen at that age,” Quinn says. “He was a center back then and scoring goals from the halfway line.”

Competitive youth soccer regularly cost upwards of $1,000 per year, plus another couple thousand in tournament and travel fees at the elite level. Many clubs offer “scholarships” to help defray costs, and Diaz de Leon figured he was on one.

It wasn’t until his final year at what is now called San Diego Soccer Club that he learned two mothers of his teammates had been quietly, anonymously, paying everything for him.

“They were living in a garage made into someone’s house – a mom, dad and four kids,” says Sally Grigoriev, whose son, Nick, played with Diaz de Leon for a decade and now is a senior forward at UC Davis. “You knew they didn’t have two nickels to rub together, but those kids were always well-mannered. They all got straight As. They were working hard to have their kids be good contributors to society and to be polite.